


Mortality

by gammacorvi



Series: Of Friendship and Wormholes [5]
Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies), star - Fandom
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-28
Updated: 2016-11-28
Packaged: 2018-09-02 20:34:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8682475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gammacorvi/pseuds/gammacorvi
Summary: "Spock is like a man in a dream. Like every evening he prepares a simple meal,  but tonight his hands are shaking and the meal is for two. Jim is a bright, vibrant presence among the ancient stones, the priceless artifacts in a home where everything speaks of the past."





	

_It is Chekhov who calls and Spock knows instantly that things have gone horribly, terribly wrong._

_“The Admiral,” Chekov begins, and then his voice breaks and he looks down to regain his composure._

_Spock didn’t expect the end to come so soon. He didn’t expect it to be like this. He had always known about the fragility and brevity of human lives, and yet, he is completely unprepared for this._

_It takes a while to get the full story from Chekov, who is devastated, hurting and suffused by guilt._

_It is too much, and in the end Spock feels his whole body shake with the sheer impossibility of his Captain’s demise. He has to terminate the connection because his own composure is slipping._

_Their Captain, Admiral James T. Kirk, with his energy and brightness and refusal to believe in no-win scenarios has finally faced death. He is gone._

_He was like the sun, Spock thinks, and now darkness has fallen._

_~~~_

_It is many decades later that another Captain of the Enterprise pays Spock a visit. Spock, at the time, takes a much needed rest from his ambassadorial duties. He has retreated to his house, in the mountains of Kir. It is a structure hanging on a steep cliffside, overlooking a vista of  peaks to the east and the Plains of Fire to the south. As all retreats in this region, it is meant for meditation and contemplation. It lacks all modern forms of communication and is only accessible by a narrow path through the mountains. To reach it is a pilgrimage in itself._

_There is, in fact, a hidden dock for a shuttle craft in the mountainside just beneath the house. After all, Vulcans are imminently practical people, and it is used for deliveries or in case of emergencies, when a shuttle can be requested via a beacon._

_Spock, himself, has gotten here by foot, as he always does and knows he always will. It is part of the journey, part of letting go of things. But this time, the exertion of the journey, the solitude of the path, the wind that comes down cool from the mountains late in the day has brought with it vivid memories that he cannot forget. He relives, in rich detail the times he spent with his Captain and reaches the house with the imprint of the Captain's spirit clear in his mind. He should have known then, he thinks later, that it was more than memory, that it was the Captain's mind, reaching out for his, across space._

_It is only a few weeks after this that he sees a lone wanderer come along the mountain path. It is Captain Jean Luc Picard, who found Spock’s Captain, he tells Spock, in a space anomaly called the Nexus and recovered him. Recovered him for the sole purpose to save the universe one more time, as if Jim, in his time had not done enough. As if one Enterprise Captain should not be plenty to save the day. Spock’s Captain had been crushed and faced his death beneath a primitive steel structure. He died a hero, Picard stresses. He saved billions and billions of lives._

_It means nothing to Spock._

_He knows Picard, knows his crew, has even heard about their Nemesis, Q, one of those omnipotent, strangely amoral beings that occupy the space-time continuum. He is confident that between all of them no universes could possibly be destroyed. What did they need his Captain for? A terrible bitterness settles into his soul. He tries to tell himself that he is unreasonable but this is soon crushed under a renewed onslaught of grief._

_After the five year mission their careers had taken them apart, only to be reunited for special occasions. When Chekov brought him notice of the Captain's death they had not seen each other for two years, Spock yearning for a reunion._

_“Please, leave,” he tells the Captain of the Enterprise and Picard leaves, his keen eyes, for a moment, resting with compassion on the broken man before him._

_“I am truly sorry, Ambassador,” he tells Spock and then he is gone._

_Ashes._

_~~~_

All this happened a long time ago. It happened in another universe. And in this universe Spock drags himself home, in the lengthening shadows of New Vulcan’s drawn out dusk. His body is weary, his feet on fire and his head throbbing steadily and painfully. He feels every single one of his 168 years.

He reaches the top of the hill along a sandy road, and a low dwelling built into the hillside becomes visible. It is the location he has chosen for his home in a universe where Vulcan, T’khasi as it was called, is no more. He stops for a moment, staggering slightly with fatigue. Of course, there is transportation available, but Spock has declined it. The road up the hill, in its solitude, reminds him of a mountain path in another time and place.

In the last year his physical and mental condition has started to deteriorate. He is suffering from debilitating headaches and the walk to this remote dwelling has started to bring back vivid recollections of that which he has lost such a long time ago. He arrives utterly exhausted but with the picture of what mattered most to him, once upon a time, in his mind.

It is an indulgence. One he should not permit himself in a world where so much has been lost and so much is waiting to be rebuilt. Why dwell on a past that belongs to another universe and can never be recovered?

“Only in memory,” Spock mumbles to himself.

He enters into his home and walks through spacious rooms out to the terrace. There he sits, surrounded by desert sands and the roots of ancient, gnarled trees, looking out over the plain and the distant mountains until darkness falls. Then he goes inside to spend many hours in meditation.

Walking the road between the Vulcan Science Academy, in the small settlement of New Shi’kahr, and his home has become his life, his daily routine, until he arrives one evening to find a K’normian arms dealer standing before his door.

~~~

Admiral James T. Kirk has suspected for the past year that the universe has played a bad joke on him. First he had been stuck in a place that that fellow Picard called the Nexus. This was initially quite pleasant. He’d had ample time to relive all his shortcomings and mistakes and set everything right that he could possibly think of. But over time it had become more and more clear that he was living an illusion. That place was a place of shadows and nothing he did there really mattered. The longer he was there the more the people in his life, who at first had seemed real and vivid, became transparent and barely _there_. None more so than the one of his companions he longed for most. At first Spock had been at the periphery. There, but overshadowed by his son, by the women in his life. But, over time everything seemed to pass. David’s death, as much as it had hurt, as much as it hurt still, although he had barely known the boy, was in the past. The women he had loved, now seemed like retreating waves on the sand. All that was left was the longing to go back out there, between the stars and have Spock by his side. Or, if the stars were unavailable, just Spock would do.

He was surrounded by shadows, alone, and the longing for his friend, the being closest to him in the universe, their minds connected in a way Jim could never understand, grew.

The Nexus, a year ago, had dumped him, unceremoniously, in a valley, nestled in the Kowah’hla mountains of K’normia. Jim had been here before, on shore leave, when he was still only an ensign, about 10 years before he ever met Spock. He recognized the place instantly. The mountainside was green and lush and he knew that a five minute walk around the bend of that road would take him into a quaint, but good sized town called T’hanory. He would be able to find accommodations and the possibility for communication and transport. He was delighted. He did not know how much time had passed but he intended to walk into town and call Spock right away.

Thank you, Nexus.

There was no Spock to be called. The subspace signature for his communicator was non- existent.The stardate on the communication terminal was way off. The K’normians seemed to have lost their prominent foreheads and suddenly looked almost exactly like humans. Jim could have passed for a K’normian without problems.

He had felt a shiver run down his spine and had closed his eyes. What had he gotten himself into now? And where was Spock?

Of course, in the end the answer was very simple. The Nexus, quite possibly a sentient and volatile entity, had not only deposited him in the past but in another timeline, and that meant essentially another universe altogether. Yes, there is a Spock in this universe. A bright young fellow, very highly spoken off, First Officer of the Enterprise, serving under his Captain, James T. Kirk.

The Admiral had felt reassured. At least that was as it should be. He had felt the urge to seek out his counterpart and give him some strict advice that would save him much grief in the future.

_Never, ever, let them take you off that Starship._

_Keep Spock at your side, always._

Simple things, but essential.

Of course, in the end he hadn’t, because of the danger of world ending paradoxes and this sort of thing. Temporal Mechanics has always given him a headache.

All of this had been unwelcome news. Especially the part where Vulcan was destroyed. He dwelled on this for quite a while, thinking about possibilities to set things right. Surely he should be able to think of a way to bring Vulcan back?

Or maybe, possibly, he was just getting old and senile.

He planned to find a way back to his universe without delay.

Just to make sure, though, because he _is_ Jim Kirk and he does not like to leave stones unturned, he set out to make sure that this universe was indeed, devoid of his Spock.

It had taken him a year, fraught with frustration and doubt. Even if he managed to get back to his own universe, if he could pull apart the fabric of space and time - what if Spock was long gone? His body broken into atoms, his katra scattered into the solar wind of 40 Eridani A?

He discovered soon that there were no other Spocks, other than the one he already knew of. And he was about to pull up his tents and figure out how to move on to another universe when he heard about the Ambassador, living on New Vulcan, who supposedly sometimes went under the name of Spock.

It wouldn’t hurt to have a look.

~~~

When the Admiral sees the old Vulcan approach through the falling darkness, his heart sinks.The setting sun is painting the sky in vermillion, blue and chiaroscuro. The contrasts are stark and beautiful. Two of New Vulcan’s moons are rising over the far horizon. The Vulcan, he notes, wears a long robe and a hood is draped loosely over his head. The Admiral sees the way the old man walks, the weariness in his step and knows this is not his Spock. His Spock does not move like this, is not this old.

 _It was a longshot, anyway,_ he thinks. But he is bitterly disappointed.

But now that he is here, he might as well talk to the Ambassador. Who knows what he might learn.

He steps forward and takes off what goes for a hat amongst K’normian arms dealers.

The old man looks up and falters. Then he reaches out with one hand as if looking for support and his knees buckle.

The Admiral jumps forward with an agility that belies his age. He puts one hand on the old man’s shoulder and another around him in support and the weight of the Vulcan almost brings him to his knees.

The hood slips off and the Admiral stares into eyes that have seen everything.

Twin jolts of terror and recognition go through him. Yes, this is Spock. Some version of him at least. Old, and worn and bent with years of suffering and grief. It is not what he expected to find. Surely this is not _his_ Spock.

But then the old man takes his arm in a vice-like grip and removes the Admiral’s hand from his shoulder and the moment they touch the Admiral feels _something._ An energy, well-known and welcome, reaching into him.

But Spock does not seem to notice. He yanks the Admiral’s arm, strong fingers digging into his muscles, painfully, and pulls him toward the dwelling.

“How dare you,” he spits, “How dare you assume his form and come here to mock me? Who are you?”

Then they are inside, among sandstone pillars and panels made out of ancient, polished wood and the Admiral realizes that it is a valid assumption. They have met enough impostors, shape shifters, mirror universe counterparts, clones and semi-omnipotent beings who can do almost anything, to last them several lifetimes.

Spock shoves the Admiral against a wall, cups one hand behind his neck and pushes his fingers into the Admiral’s meld-points.

The Admiral adjusts his head fractionally and relaxes. Spock’s mind slips into his, effortlessly, as if it is meant to be there. The Admiral’s eyes are open and they look into Spock's. There is a mental exclamation and then Spock lifts his other hand to the Admiral’s face to deepen the meld.

It is not the first time the Admiral experiences a mind-meld. He has melded with Spock over the years, always for a specific purpose, sometimes for information, sometimes even for manipulation. There is one time, when he knows Spock has eased painful memories in his mind. Only once has Spock asked permission to enter his mind. Only once has the Admiral asked for a meld, to confirm his identity.

_You know my mind._

The question of consent has never come up between them. It has, to tell the truth, never occurred to the Admiral until this moment.

 _How does he know,_ the Admiral thinks, _how does he know that he's allowed?_

Spock reacts to the question in the Admiral’s mind by pressing the fingers of his left hand into the Admiral’s remaining meld-points. There is a rush of energy, a flow of emotion and then painful pressure when Spock probes deeper.

The Admiral makes a small mental adjustment, one that Spock taught him once in a rather desperate situation, and the pain goes away. The superior mind of the Vulcan slips deeper and then the Admiral feels a diffusion of shock, disbelief, joy and guilt somewhere in the farthest reaches of his brain.

_Jim._

Spock mental presence withdraws, with ultimate care.

“Jim,” Spock says, his voice gravelly and wavering. “My Captain, my friend, my t’hy’la. Forgive me. Forgive my intrusion. I could not believe.”

The Admiral looks at his old friend.

“I never thought that I would find you,” he says.

He folds Spock in his arms, carefully, because Spock is not one to be hugged, but Spock puts his arms around the Admiral in turn and somehow they end up on the stone floor, holding each other.

Spock is like a man in a dream. Like every evening he prepares a simple meal,  but tonight his hands are shaking and the meal is for two. Jim is a bright, vibrant presence among the ancient stones, the priceless artifacts in a home where everything speaks of the past. He walks around, his bulk still clad in the clothes of a K’normian arms dealer, a ‘disguise’ that must have drawn some stares at the New Vulcan spaceport. He touches the spines of old tomes and strokes the texture of original Vulcan carvings. He leans casually against the counter in Spock’s kitchen, his arms folded, his eyes laughing. He is the light in the darkness. Timelessness in the succession of years. That which rises from destruction, restored. As he stands there, there is a permanence about him. Something that says, I was here yesterday, I am here today, I will be here tomorrow. And Spock starts to understand the true nature of the soul that he gave to, first his loyalty, and then his love, so many years ago.

“Bet you thought, you’d gotten rid of me,” Jim laughs, “but I'm like a bad penny, I always turn up.”

Spock has not heard this expression in years and he feels warmed by Jim’s unsentimental and irreverent attitude. Isn’t it just like him to drop by after a hundred years and pretend as if nothing has happened?

Later they kneel on the meditation mat, facing each other. Jim’s gaze is solemn and warm.

“It has been too long, my friend,” he says, ‘I never meant to leave for so long.”

_One hundred years._

“Please, permit me,” Spock says, raising a hand.

“No permission is necessary,” Jim says. “You know my mind.”

Spock presses his hand against Jim’s face and thus they stay for a long time.

~~~

The Admiral is tired but restless. Quietly he walks through the house. Spock is sleeping. The Admiral has looked in on him three times, listening to the even breathing, desperately worried. Spock looks so old, so frail, so hurt. If something happens to him the Admiral knows it is more than he can bear.

He wanders through the wide hallway into the living room, running his hand up and down the red sandstone pillars with the carvings, depicting scenes from Vulcan mythology. Red sand flows in where the front of the house is open towards the desert, encroaching on the, very un-Vulcan plush, leather armchairs and sofa. It looks beautiful and careless, a timeless, gnarled root, snaking over the dark floor, among the grains of sand. The Admiral suspects it is a carefully designed effect, probably held in check by a forcefield.

The Admiral knows that Vulcan lifespans count over two centuries. But Spock is half-human.

If only Bones were here.

Spock has given the Admiral a room at the front of the house.

There is a communications terminal behind one of the, beautifully marbled, wood panels. The Admiral doesn’t hesitate.

~~~

Leonard McCoy turns on the monitor when the subspace communication comes in. He is in the middle of something, but the call is from one of the terminals in Ambassador Spock’s house. If the Ambassador calls it must be important.

But the face that appears on the monitor is that of a human in late middle-age, jovial and, as they say, well-preserved.

“Bones,” the man exclaims, “Thank God you’re available. It’s good to see you!”

Leonard is taken aback, then has a good, long look at the man.

“Good God, Jim,” he finally cries, hastily shutting the door to his office. “It’s you! What the hell have you gotten yourself into now.”

It’s unmistakably the Captain, about 40 years older and with the wrong stature and eye colour. Since this is Jim, Bones is not really surprised. Still, there is cause for alarm. He immediately starts to formulate a solution to revert Jim’s age, but then decides it’s better to first hear what happened. Then, in a strange double-take on reality he sees, through the transparent aluminum wall that connects his office to the rest of sickbay, the sickbay door swish open and Spock and Jim enter. Jim is bleeding freely from a gash in his forehead, trying to stem the flow with a towel. They are in the middle of a heated argument.

Bones frowns, then sighs. The situation would be mind-shattering for anyone who doesn’t know Jim Kirk. But here, on the Enterprise, stuff like this is to be expected.

He’s pretty sure Jim looks as if he’ll live, so he leaves it up to one of the nurses to deal with them and opaques the wall. If this man really is another version of Jim, he has enough on his hands.

~~~

Several days later, on New Vulcan, the other version of Jim steps out of the entrance to the Katric Ark into the bright sunlight. The air is hot and dry and unlike the Vulcans in their heavy garments he is wearing lightweight trousers and a tunic, cool in the hot desert breeze.

The entrance is high up a mountainside and a precarious path leads down into a small oasis, nestled between sandstone, eroded into bizarre shapes. Jim can see the top of green trees, down there. There is a source of water, rising up deep from within the planet’s aquifers. It only flows into the desert a short ways until it drains away.

He hears the rustle of Vulcan ceremonial garments behind him and makes room for T’Pau and four helpers who appear on the ledge beside him.

With a curt nod in his direction T’Pau departs down the path that is hewn into the mountainside. He can hear the tinkling of the bells that her helpers hold, all the way down.

The Vulcans have taken to the Admiral without batting their eyelids. That he is from another universe, presumably the same one as the esteemed Ambassador Spock, they take as an established fact. Several of them have expressed their satisfaction that he has come to join them and he is commonly referred to as Admiral Kirk, T’hy’la to Spock, which seems to hold a particular significance to the Vulcans and seems to infer that the Admiral now has a special status among them. The Admiral is not sure he understands, but it seems to be expected that he is living in Spock’s home and that they are always at each other’s side.

“It is the way of t’hy’lara,” Spock says when the Admiral mentions it, and it is clear that the human word for friend is not quite describing the same concept, but Spock grows vague trying to explain, starting a discourse about Vulcan mythology and in the end the Admiral does not know more than he did before.

The Admiral turns when Spock and Sarek step out into the sunlight.

Sarek sighs, pulls up his hood and hides his hands in his sleeves. He is a man in his prime, much younger than Spock and he looks worn. Since the day he and the elders were rescued by his son, the younger Spock, he has carried Surak’s katra. The soul of the Vulcan culture. It has taken its toll.

Today T’Pau, the grand old lady of Vulcan society, head of state and high-priestess in one, has attempted the transfer of Surak’s katra into a newly fashioned vre’katra, a receptacle made out of desert glass found on New Vulcan. The ritual is an ancient one and has never been performed in modern time, but, as Jim well knows from another universe, T’Pau is well able to turn mythological concepts and ancient ritual into modern reality.

Now Surak’s katra rests in a niche of the Katric Ark behind a pedestal on which sits the Kir’Shara, an equally ancient device, containing a recording of Surak’s teachings.

“I wouldn’t want my katra to rest in a vessel, however beautiful, for the rest of eternity,” the Admiral had scoffed when Spock mentioned what they were going to do.

“You misunderstand,” Spock had answered. “The vre’katra is an anchor, not a prison. Surak’s katra is free to roam the universe. The vre’katra is his foothold amongst us. In this way his spirit is able to fertilize Vulcan culture.”

As with all mystical concepts, the Admiral is not sure he understands the intricacies. He is, however, worried. The Vulcans, for all their will to survive, are a dying race. Spock has projected that at the rate the birthrate is declining, in a thousand years there will be no Vulcans left.

Doubtlessly, the Admiral thinks, the universe will go on without the Vulcans. Although he wonders. _Will_ it? Without their regard and acceptance of all lifeforms in the known universe? Their innate morality, their persistence in the face of destruction? The Admiral knows how deep their feelings run, how great their compassion is.

Although they have made the pursuit of logic the purpose of their lives they know that logic is not everything.

What, oh what will the universe do without them?

Or maybe the question is a more personal one. What would Admiral James T. Kirk do without his friend?

“It is done,” Spock says beside him. “In due time we will be able to transfer other katras that were saved to the Katric Ark.”

The Admiral knows there are a handful of other carriers of ancient katras. Vre’katras are being crafted for their use, but their transfer depends on the old ritual that only T’Pau knows how to perform. Or maybe, Jim thinks, it is fair to say that only T’Pau has the mental energy to make it happen.

Spock has paused, looking at the man who in another universe was his father.

“So few are left. So few.”

Sarek inclines his head, adjusts the hood of his robe and his face falls into shadows. Without a word he departs, his steps heavy but steady on the rocky path.

Spock touches the back of the Admiral’s hand, lightly, in an almost ritualistic gesture and the Admiral feels a circuit close. It is  an affirmation of their friendship and of that which makes them more than friends. T’hy’lara. Bloodbrothers. Mind-brothers.

They stand there and look out over the ancient plains of this planet on which civilization never arose. A world, wide and beautiful in stunning contrasts and vivid colours, waiting for a race to come and claim it and give them a home. But maybe the Vulcans have lost too much. T’Khasi, their planet, which was ground to dust and sucked into a black hole. Six billion katras, somehow lost, scattered to the stellar winds, dissolved into the substance of the universe.

Without them, Spock tells him, Vulcan ultimately cannot go on. They were meant to be the teachers of future generations. Without them the substance of Vulcan is lost.

The Admiral wishes he could go out there in a spaceship and fix things. But he has no ship anymore, no crew. All that he has is standing here on the ledge beside him. The friend, whom he has followed across time and space. And he can only hope that the forces that rule the universe are forces of goodness and intent, that destiny is a concept to be trusted and that, in this vast stream, that Spock sometimes refers to as the multiverse, they will not be lost to each other again.

~~~

They return home, at dusk, to find a Starfleet transport from the spaceport, outside their door. Since New Vulcan has a planetwide shield for security reasons, simply to beam down is not an option.

Several security personnel are playing ball in the lengthening shadows, seemingly unbothered by the lingering heat.

Spock looks up, with pleasure.

“The kids are back,” he says.

The kids turn out to be Leonard McCoy, who has taken over the kitchen and is cooking what looks like a rather lavish meal. Spock, the young Spock, surveying his counterparts library and Captain James T. Kirk, tall, blond, with bright blue eyes, sprawled on the sofa, carelessly turning one of those priceless, Vulcan artifacts over and over in restless hands.

“You know what, Spock,” he just says, “This place is like a museum. We should take the old man out patrolling the Neutral Zone. It’ll do him good.”

When he sees the old Spock, he jumps up and puts down the artifact.

“Sir, Ambassador, it’s good to see you again.”

Then the Captain’s eyes turn on the Admiral.

Uhura comes strolling in from the outside, carrying a handful of fragrant, yellow flowers.

Her eyes follow her Captain’s gaze and she walks right up to the Admiral, planting a kiss on his cheek.

“Welcome to this Universe, Admiral,” she says, “You are among friends.”

Then, unperturbed, she walks to the kitchen counter and places the flowers in a bowl. Apparently they’re meant to be eaten.

The Admiral looks stricken.

“Uhura?” he asks.

She looks at him and laughs.

“Yes, Sir,” she says, “It’s me.”

“Bones!”

Leonard comes forward and is swallowed up by a bear hug. The Admiral has tears in his eyes.

Cooler is the welcome by Spock. He and the Admiral look each other up and down from a distance.

“Mr. Spock,” the Admiral finally acknowledges.

“Admiral,” Spock inclines his head.

The meal is a boisterous affair with the Admiral and Bones doing almost all of the talking. The Captain is probably drinking too much and the Ambassador looks on with eyes that see everything. Spock is unresponsive and stiff and excuses himself at the end of the meal to go outside where he seems to admire the night sky.

“A word, Captain,” the Admiral says when they are finished. While the others clear up the dishes and the Ambassador follows Spock outside, the Captain and the Admiral retreat toward the back of the house where they can be seen, the Captain leaning with one hand against a sandstone pillar, head slightly bend, the Admiral talking to him, intently. The Captain is nodding.

“Oh, no,” Uhura says to Leonard, in distress, “No, good can come of that…”

“As if it is not enough to deal with one of them,” Leonard confirms. “Now we have two to deal with. God help us all…”

~~~

The Captain and the Admiral get on like a house on fire. They have decided that it is an excellent idea to take both the Admiral and the Ambassador on a cruise to the Enterprise’s next mission, a geological survey of a newly discovered world. It will give Bones time, or so the Admiral claims, to thoroughly assess the Ambassador’s health status. The mission in itself is deemed to be low-key and risk free and when Spock has reservations the Captain looks at him surprised:

“Come on, Spock, what could possibly go wrong.”

“I cannot believe, Captain, that you are that naive,” Spock counters. “In all probability anything that can possibly go wrong will go wrong. It is the way things work around you. And now there are two of you.”

“That is not a very scientific statement, Spock.”

“It is a fact born of long experience.”

The Captain is irritated.

“If it’s so hard to deal with me, stay behind and fill in for the Ambassador. I’m sure the Vulcans would be delighted.”

“As First Officer it is my job to ensure yours and the crew’s safety. I will bear the hardship of dealing with you for the sake of duty.”

Spock’s face hasn’t changed but his eyes have gone soft and the Captain laughs.

“I have calculated a 87.8% percent probability that this mission will not go as planned. There is also a 16.8% probability that we will encounter significant danger.”

“Only 17%? I’ll take those odds, Mr. Spock.”

Spock looks troubled.

~~~

Of course, Spock turns out to be right. The planet, class M, in a remote solar system, supposedly only inhabited by lower life-forms, nevertheless turns out to hold a small colony of humanoids. Where they come from is a mystery although Uhura says their language is similar to Algolian, only more primitive. Her theory is not supported by the DNA studies which show that the colony is not native to the planet but also doesn't match any known species. With only about 15% of the galaxy more or less thoroughly charted and a whole universe out there, the origin of the settlers might never be satisfactorily explained.

The proto-Algolians, as the anthropological team takes to calling them, live in a vast network of underground caverns, since the system’s star is too bright for them. They use protective suits when they venture outside, which they rarely do. This is undoubtedly the reason their presence was missed during the initial survey. Still, Spock concludes, the initial survey must have been conducted in a haphazard way. He will have to have a word with Starfleet Operations.

Unfortunately the proto-Algolian society, although only numbering about 20.000 souls, is fractured right down the middle. Both sides call the other rebels, and the reason for the war seem to be solely cultural. Apparently one side refuses to acknowledge the traditional group marriage. They are, it seems, against marriage in principle.

The details are complicated, but Uhura and the team of onboard linguists and anthropologists are fascinated.

The survey and the anthropological studies go well until Ensign Cho and Ensign Chekov are ambushed by one of the factions and held hostage. What until then was an interesting scientific challenge becomes a diplomatic nightmare.

~~~

When Spock regains consciousness something is pressing on his throat, making it hard for him to breathe. He lies very still, calmly noting the state his body is in, the hurt of numerous bruises, a possible fracture of the left ulna. He is lying on his hands, still chained behind him. There is the press of rock around him. He concludes that he is not seriously wounded and as long as the rocks don’t shift and he is found in time, there is every chance that he will make it out of this predicament alive. The weight of the rock is heavy on his body and he is suddenly glad that it was him and not Ensigns Cho and Chekov in the cave at the time of the blast. Their inferior physiology would not have survived the cave-in.

Time goes on and there is dust in his lungs, making him want to cough. His throat is dry. His mind is in darkness. Maybe, he thinks, this is it, after all. A fitting way to go. Yet, there are regrets. So much work remains to be done. An end to pain? He is unsure of the outcome. Does a katra, free of the body suffer? Will he be able to join with the katras of his ancestors? What is death?

Those are questions to which he thought he knew the answers, but on the threshold things look differently.

He will never see Nyota again.

The realization is unexpectedly harsh. She will be lost to him. As will Jim. There is no hope his katra will be recovered. He will be lost to them, too.

Death, so long courted, suddenly seems like a gamble, more suited for a man like Jim Kirk who pursues the unknown than for a mind like Spock’s, used to logic. Death, Spock concludes, is not logical. And yet, it is true.

The stones shift and he almost loses consciousness, clinging onto it by a thread.

A tiny spark ignites in the darkness of his mind and he tries to hold on to it, lungs struggling for breath, pain traveling up his arms, twisted behind him.

Eventually he is saved by a phaser beam, carefully vaporizing rock around him, clearing a space. The pressure on his throat and chest lifts and he gulps in precious air.

“Spock?” his Captain whispers.

The bright spark in his mind is joined by the narrow beam of a flashlight and Spock coughs and opens his eyes.

His Captain's face is right beside him, blue eyes blazing.

“Spock, how hurt are you?”

Spock does a quick inventory. With his breathing restored any imminent danger is gone. The phaser has fused the rock above and prevents further cave-in. There is pain. But pain is just that, pain, especially for a Vulcan. There is no catastrophic injury.

“I am functional, Captain.”

The beam of light jerks to the ceiling and there is a quick intake of breath beside him. Then the beam wanders back to his face and the Captain inches closer, finally putting a hand on his upper arm. The contact is unexpected and Spock, his touch-telepathy oversensitive at the best of times is flooded with intense emotion.

Residual fear rolled into an image of a vast snowfield and a twisted body in a grave of ice. Relief, bonded to a dizzying succession of snapshots of Spock, looking intently at a 3D chess set, standing beside the Captain's chair, grasping the Captain's shoulder in a heavy hand and spinning him around.

_I cannot allow you to do this._

All this permeated by an underlying loop of Ensigns Cho and Chekov, chained, being kicked forward by members of one of the rebel factions.

A great deal of panic.

Dominating all these emotions a stream of… annoyance. Clear and bright like sparkling water.

The hand is removed as if it had burned itself.

“I’m sorry, Spock. I didn't think. Are you okay?”

Interestingly, though the amount of emotion in the touch was staggering and disorienting there was an undercurrent there, unreadable, but deeply reassuring. Its absence is unwelcome.

“There is no need to apologize, Captain.”

_Annoyance. It was to be expected._

“Let's get you out of here. Can you roll on your side?”

Spock does so, not without difficulty. There is that quick intake of breath again and brief heat as the phaser beam slices through metal. The chains fall away.

And although the Captain is more than aware how difficult it is for Spock to be touched casually, he puts a hand around one of Spock's wrists and examines the damage.

“Jeez, Spock, that doesn't look good.”

“I assure you, Captain, there is no permanent damage done.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

It takes a good deal of maneuvering and squeezing to get them both out of the narrow tunnel that the Captain cut into the rock.

In the end Spock is leaning, dizzy and unwell, against the rock in the far end of the rebel cave.

“We have to get going, Spock. The structural integrity of this section is damaged. Everything could come crashing down.”

Spock follows his Captain obediently. He wants to ask how Jim found him in the vast network of caverns. He is well aware that the diamagnetic ore, present in the rock, blocked all but the most basic tricorder functions. But he thinks about the bright filament of light that had sparked in his mind. The tangible awareness of his friends core that had kept him struggling and prevented him from giving way to the beckoning of darkness. He already has his answer.

~~~

It seems that almost all members of an extreme offshoot of one of the rebel factions died in the cave-in after their explosives blew up.

“By the way,” Jim says, “the president is very pleased. He thinks that now that the splinter group is wiped out they might have a chance at negotiations. I’m thinking of bringing in a Federation mediator. He also he gave me his sincerest condolences about your death. Called you a necessary sacrifice.”

Spock stands upright and pulls down his uniform shirt, not bothering to remove the dust. He sways a little but raises a questioning eyebrow.

“Oh, yeah, he’s still in one piece. Sulu hauled me away before I could hit him. Remind me to put a commendation in his file.”

They make their way over the rubble back to the entrance of the cave where they are greeted by joyful exclamations . Spock patiently endures the touch of their crewmates until Jim notes his increasing pallor and strain and puts himself between Spock and everyone else. Then Bones pushes his way through the crowd.

“Well,” he huffs, “you don’t look the worse for wear. Considering that we thought you were dead.”

He scans Spock thoroughly with his tricorder, gives him two hyposprays and turns to Jim:

“He’s a bit bruised but otherwise there’s not a thing wrong with him. Since he’s Vulcan I don’t expect any significant psychological fallout from this experience either. As far as I’m concerned he’s fit for duty.”

He gathers up his medical bag.

“Come by sickbay later and I’ll treat those bruises properly. That’s an order.”

Bones hurries away. The proto-Algolians have no doctors, only healers and Bones has been under much demand.

There is much work to do for the Enterprise crew. It has been established that the Prime Directive does not apply in this case, since the inhabitants of the planet are obviously colonists, even though they have forgotten how to conduct space flight. Also it seems that they have had contact with the infamous K’normian arms dealers. At least that’s what a preliminary examination of the explosives that were used, suggests.

Spock is soon involved in determining the structural integrity of the cave and gives a hand clearing out the rubble and looking for survivors. He ignores the pain in his strained muscles and his Captain's concerned glances. He is Vulcan and if anyone can shake off what just happened it is him.

Halfway through the afternoon a familiar voice says behind him:

“A word, Mr. Spock.”

It is the Admiral. His round face is somber. Spock follows him into a side tunnel where they cannot be overheard.

“What the hell did you think you were doing?” the Admiral spits, not a trace of the happy joviality that already has led several people, some of them high up in Starfleet’s hierarchy, to seriously underestimate him.

Spock is taken aback.

“Admiral?”

“Never do that again. Do you have any idea what that was like? To think all morning that you were dead?”

Spock is puzzled. Why would the Admiral care? They don’t speak. They rarely look at each other. They go out of each other’s way. Once the Admiral put a casual hand on his arm and Spock shrank away as if he had been burned.

The Admiral’s voice grows soft.

“Do you have any idea what you mean to your Captain?”

Ah, this is about Jim, not about the Admiral. Spock should have known that the same old complaint should be restated. Supposedly he does not care sufficiently for his own life. He feels irritation rise and snuffs it out instantly.

“It was the logical course of action,” he says coldly. “I regret that it caused the Captain pain, but ultimately…”

The Admiral throws up his hands.

“Pain,” he hisses. “You could have died. You were almost crushed to death. It was pure luck.”

“Which is exactly the point…”

“Look, Spock… ”

The Admiral is pacing, a few steps to the left, a few steps to the right.

“I know you did the right thing. Not the logical, the _right_ thing. I know how your half-human mind works. You say ‘logic’ and what you mean is ‘I did what felt right at the time and now I’m justifying it by applying logic to it.”

The Admiral’s words leave Spock speechless, not so much because, spoken to a Vulcan they can be considered a blatant insult, but because the Admiral is right. This is indeed what he does in situations as emotional as this one. Yes, he _had_ acted on impulse. Ensign Cho and Ensign Chekov were in the hands of a straggle of amateur rebels who hardly knew how to use their own weapons, likely to shoot themselves and others purely by mistake. The rebels had put them in chains and when one of them held a weapon to Ensign Cho’s head, Spock had seen the expression in Cho’s and in Chekhov’s eyes. The situation was volatile. So Spock had started forward, knowing that the rebels were looking for a more high-profile hostage.

It is disconcerting to be so thoroughly exposed by a man he hardly knows.

The Admiral has lowered his voice. He sounds grave.

“Spock, do you know what it would do to your Captain if you died?”

Spock looks into the man’s hazel eyes, wondering who he is. How similar is his soul to Jim's? Is there a mysterious connection linking individualities across the multiverse?

“You are part of his soul. Losing you is going to break him. He will look all right. He will do his job. But inside he will be dead.”

Spock looks at him, disturbed.

Apparently the Admiral interpretes the stare as incomprehension because he adds, irritated:

“I know. I’ve been there.”

Spock lowers his gaze. None of this is technically news to him. Spock knows the Captain values Spock's life above his own. And Spock reciprocates. The term t’hy’la, in fact, implies all that, even if he has never explained this to the Captain.

_You are part of his soul._

He clears his voice. His body hurts.

“It was only logical.”

“Have you heard nothing that I said?”

“On the contrary, Admiral, I have listened to you closely. Although my actions seemed impulsive I assure you that they were logical. As you have so aptly pointed out - I was almost crushed to death. My Vulcan physiology prevented catastrophic injury. If Ensign Cho and Ensign Chekov had been in my place they would now be dead.”

The Admiral looks at him, eyes narrowed, unhappy.

“You know, my Spock always does that to me. I think I’m winning an argument and then…bam… But you know I’m right, Spock. Even if I were not, you still defied the Captain’s direct order.”

There is no arguing about that. The Captain, actually, had said: _Spock, no, don’t._ But it comes down to the same thing.

“It was a request, not an order.”

“You are mincing words, Mr. Spock. Next time he will make it an order and you will still defy him”

“There was no choice.”

“Ensign Cho and Ensign Chekov are resourceful crewmen. They would have found a way.”

“Nothing would have happened to them because the Captain was about to trade _himself_ ,” Spock snaps. “This conversation is over.”

He stalks away, leaving the Admiral behind, feeling almost sorry for not acknowledging the truth in his words. But he feels the need to keep the Admiral at arm’s length. His soul is too similar to Jim’s. Spock knows he cannot handle another connection this deep. It would tear him apart.

Also, the Admiral is not Spock’s responsibility.

~~~

After that the afternoon goes on too long. Spock, with his inborn sense of the passage of time, loses track of the hours, until he feels the Captain’s heavy hand on his shoulders. He turns around to look into the Captain’s eyes, dull with exhaustion, his face streaked with dirt.

“Return to your quarters, Mr. Spock,” he says. “You need rest.”

Their work is basically done, so Spock doesn’t protest.

“You should rest, too, Jim,” he says and sees how his Captain’s eyes grow soft while his face stays hard and unapproachable.

“I will rest,” he says, “When I have time.”

“Then it is my duty…”

“Don’t talk to me about duty, Spock. I gave you an order. But apparently my orders are only worth following if you feel like it. ”

They have been over this before. Spock tries to answer but finds himself watching the Captain's retreating back.

Annoyance indeed.

~~~

When he comes back to his quarters Uhura is not yet back. He wonders if she has heard about his misadventure.

He undresses slowly, noting the stiffness, the pain, the multiple bruises. He remembers the Doctor’s order to come by sickbay but decides it can wait. Possibly until doomsday. He takes a sonic shower, wishing for hot, dry desert sand to purify his body, to scour away the grime and the exhaustion.

He puts on a Vulcan robe, letting it settle in heavy folds around his body. Then he kneels down on the meditation mat.

Jim is right, of course. So is Nyota. He should guard his own life as if it was theirs.

_The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one._

A Vulcan phrase that is deeply ingrained in his being, in every single one of his actions.

Yet Jim, his Captain, who has made illogic a form of art and a way to live by, who is ruled by emotion and gut-feeling, the t’hy’la to Spock’s soul, doesn't agree. Jim’s gut-feeling is almost never wrong. The careful application of Spock’s analysis to Jim’s instinct works in almost any situation. And when Spock once tried to justify his actions with the Vulcan proverb, Jim had looked at him.

“No, Spock, you’re wrong. It’s a phrase to justify sacrificing individuals for the greater good. I don’t believe in that. Every single being is the universe. Everyone is worth everything. And you…”

And here he had almost stabbed his finger into Spock's chest, stopping just short of touching.

“… you are worth the same. Your needs outweigh the needs of the many.”

Spock has never heard logic as faulty. And yet, the Captain’s words contain a kernel of truth. It is what he lives by. He never leaves people behind. He does not allow anyone to get lost. On the other side, he is, himself, willing to sacrifice himself both for his crew and for Spock. He is a man of deep contradiction.

Also there is more than this to consider.

_“You are part of his soul. Losing you is going to break him. He will look all right. He will do his job. But inside he will be dead.”_

Spock knows how much his father suffered when the bond between him and Spock’s mother was severed upon her death. How much he suffers still. It is a common occurrence in those cases where a katra was not recovered. With the loss of 6 billion Vulcan souls this suffering has become a common, very Vulcan trauma. It is regrettable but there is nothing to be done about it. The Admiral’s words are an apt description of what happens when a bond breaks. The mythical and rare bond between t’hy’lara is considered the highest form of a mental bond. It is also the one that creates the most severe suffering in the one who is left behind. An unfortunate side effect that lies in the very nature of the bond.

Spock has resisted the temptation to bond with Nyota in the Vulcan way for the sole reason to spare her the agony of a broken bond. Now he traces the golden filament in his mind that connects him to his friend.

“ _Losing you is going to break him. He will look all right. He will do his job. But inside he will be dead.”_

It is unthinkable to imagine his friend and Captain being subjected to this.

It is a logical enough reason to take the Captain's and Nyota’s advice  to guard and value his own life as if it was theirs.

~~~

“No,” the Admiral says, and it is hard even to get that one word out.

“I’m sorry, Jim.”

Bones looks helpless and doesn't try to hide it behind false reassurance. The Admiral is grateful for that.

They are in their quarters on the Enterprise, the Ambassador resting comfortably in the living area. The windows open up to the warbling field of the warp effect. Today the beauty of it is lost to them.

“It is not that Ambassador Spock is ill, Jim. But the scans show clearly that he is past the natural limitations of his life span. It is to be expected that his condition will deteriorate. There is nothing I can do. Nothing anyone can do.”

“But the Vulcan lifespan…”

The Admiral’s voice breaks with emotion. He struggles visibly to continue the sentence but is unsuccessful and ends up rubbing a shaking hand over his face.

Bones pretends not to have noticed.

“Yes, you’re right. According to Vulcan physiology he would have many decades left. But Ambassador Spock is half-human and already well beyond a human age.”

The Admiral can’t speak. His whole body is shaking and he sits down, heavily, before his knees give out.

In alarm Bones gropes for a hypospray with a tranquilizer  when the Ambassador speaks.

He seems calm and unaffected.

“How long, Doctor?”

Bones turns to him.

“It’s hard to say, but my guess is that you have a few years left now that Jim is at your side. Maybe two. Maybe three. But I’m speculating.”

After Bones leaves the Ambassador looks at his grieving friend.

“I’m still here, Jim.”

But the Admiral doesn't seem to hear. They sit like that in silence until, finally, he manages to speak.

“I don't know how to do this, Spock. I’ve been through this once before. I don't think I can do it again.”

_You are part of his soul. Losing you is going to break him. He will look all right. He will do his job. But inside he will be dead._

Spock’s voice is soft, his words are not.

“You can. You must.”

Humans were not made for this. The death of someone linked to one's mind is excruciating, even for a full Vulcan. Jim has always been the defier of odds. The conqueror of the no-win scenario. Spock is not sure his friend even believes in death. After all these years, separated by time and space, Spock believed him dead. He should be dead. And he is still here.

It will be harder for him than for anyone else.

“You will carry my katra.”

Spock has an immortal soul. He believes that humans are the same. It is only logical.

“My people need you. They need both of us. And as you once said. We are better together than apart. I believe this to be true. I promise you…”

Spock voice is gravelly, ancient like one of the old roots still growing in his garden back on New Vulcan.

“... I promise you that I will not leave you. We will not be apart.”

A tear slips down the Admiral’s face. He wipes it away with a hand that is still shaking.

“I will hold you to it,” he says.


End file.
